The present invention relates generally to measurement appliances and diagnostic testing equipment. More specifically, the present invention relates to data measurement devices and in particular to digital measurement collection devices.
Military armored vehicles have increased greatly in complexity over the last 50 years. Tanks in particular have undergone radical improvements over that period and today bristle with internal electronics. Internal electronics of the modern tank not only augment offensive capabilities, but also now support primary power systems, such as propulsion and power transmission. The augmentation of internal tank systems with electronics allows for precise monitoring of maintenance schedules and the recording of historical performance of subsystems for later maintenance analysis. In turn, improved monitoring procedures based upon augmented internal electronics has led to overall operational readiness of our tank forces.
Increased complexity of internal electronics for modern armored vehicles has led to a new complexities and in particular has led to difficulty in monitoring internal failures in vehicle component electronics or Line Replaceable Units (xe2x80x9cLRUsxe2x80x9d) as they are commonly referred to.
In the past and currently with some vehicles such as the M1A1, tank fault isolation consisted of xe2x80x9cfix-on-failurexe2x80x9d response or repair through manual fault isolation procedures, typically with the assistance of detailed technical manuals. The former is unacceptable since a critical failure in an electronic component in the field can have disastrous effects on a tank command""s readiness. The latter, on the other hand, requires cumbersome test equipment, including testing interface boxes, specialized cables, and adapters, and an array of technical manuals. Much of which is difficult or impossible to apply in field operations. The test set currently being used for the M1 is the Simplified Test Equipmentxe2x80x94M1 Series Vehicle and M2/M3 Fighting Vehicle Systems, or STE-M1/FVS for short. A high level of experience and expertise is required by an operator of STE-M1/FVS test equipment.
In response, some newer tanks have features that assist in fault isolation procedures. For example, the Bradley Fighting Vehicle has a system 1553 data bus which may be used to run Built-In-Test (xe2x80x9cBITxe2x80x9d). A run-time BIT allows for isolation to a specific ambiguity group, but additional test equipment must be utilized to break the ambiguity to a specific LRU. Moreover, even with the advent of a data bus that supports testing, all current fault isolation testing must be performed in a non-operational maintenance mode, and testing equipment must still be carried to the vehicle with the associated removal of installed operational cables to each LRU in favor of the testing cables. Therefore, fault isolation of LRUs in current armored vehicles is difficult and limited in availability.
Therefore, there exists a need in our current fleet of military armored vehicles, such as tanks, for an apparatus that will allow for measuring performance and evaluating the status of LRUs while still in full operational combat mode.
It is the object of the present invention to provide an apparatus that collects data from line replaceable units in an armored vehicle.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a method for collecting data on electronic systems in an armored vehicle.
It is yet a further object of the invention to provide a system of interconnected measurement modules that collect selected data from assigned electronic sub-systems of an armored vehicle over an integrated testing network and pass that data to a host computing device for analysis.
In summary, the invention consists of a measurement module having one or more circuit assembly boards, two data/power connectors, and a target connector to access target signals. The circuit assembly boards include electronics for accessing and storing selected signal data emanating from the connected target system. Signal data may be accessed from 1-128 target signal sources and sampled through two separate channels. An on-board microcontroller controls signal selection and data sampling rates and also provides recorded data transfer over a USB bus to a host computing device. The host computing device has the capability of running a testing application for sending commands to each measurement module to retrieve target signal data from the module""s buffer memory. Using proper testing application functions from the host computing device, each module can be commanded to access and store representative data from a number of signal sources at each target system. Each module can be connected to another module, and to the host computing device over the USB. The host computer device may be detachably connected to the USB, and there-through to the modules, at will. Power is provided via the interconnecting cables to each module.